There are about 1.5 billion internet users in the world[3], meaning, on average, 1 in 5 human beings on the planet are users. Internet Explorer is the most popular browser (used by 52% of users, poor schmucks) followed by Firefox (43%).[4]

In Africa, there are 51 million internet users, which is just 5% of the total African population.

South Africa has 5.1 million internet users, ranking fourth (behind Nigeria, Egypt, and Morocco) on the continent[5].

Of the 175 million websites that exist, some small fraction have been designed by professional website designers. In this design process, they should consider the needs of the end-user as well as the desires of the client – the person who pays for the website.

Yet in a typical real-world design situation, the designer occassionally interacts with the client, but almost never interacts with the users.

Some earlier studies (c.2003) found that designers respected few user's constraints, and introduced several usability violations that hampered user's activities, while focussing on the client's constraints. Perhaps things have improved over the past five years?

Nope. In a study published last year, Aline Chevalier of the University of Paris X-Nanterre confirmed this finding: both novice and professional designers favoured the client over the user, even when they had the opportunity to communicate with a user spokesperson.

It's high time that webdesign educators teach their students to consider user's needs as central.

Chevalier writes:

"Especially in early design stages in which central design decisions are made. Moreover, researchers should examine whether the same pattern of results hold in other design domains, such as architecture or engineering."